Imagine a conversation between Lifeweaver, the updated brig and Lucio.
Lifeweaver: So I can create a flower to elevate or block people, I can throw a giant tree to heal everyone, dash around, teleport people to me and more, and you?
Brig: Oh you should see my new ultimate, I become immortal, stun half of the enemy team while protecting everyone in my team with my giant shield and on top of that I can throw health packs, what about you Lucio?
Lucio: Me go fast.
Are they so scared of speed that they donāt touch him for months? Heās clearly lackluster currently.
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Also: Ana, get nerfed vs tanks. You might want that Sauronās eye directed elsewhere ; )
Not a topic about Ana and itās deserved in 5v5 and only a minor nerf, plus she still has other tools to make her strong in general.
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Lucio is so weak right now outside of OWL and tbh it stems from his ultimate
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Lucio is bad right now smh
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Yeah I still see other people playing him in GM in my games or even in the T500 ranking but they are few and far between, in most games I feel detrimental to my team playing Lucio when I could just lock Zen and spam the enemy tank or click heads.
Lucio is definitely not bad 
He was a must pick in season 1&2. Its Just not his meta. Speed isnt as useful right now in the game, brigs peel is the more useful utility cus of ball being very strong.
Brig is currently better than him and they are both never meta together unless they are the meta.
If you want aoe healing you go brig OR lucio. 1 of them will always be the better pick over the other depending on the meta, which is brig right now.
Brig wasnt played in season 1&2 because lucio was so good in that meta. He made her redundant like she now makes him redundant. Just wait til we go back to a more fast paced meta and heāll be played again
If you buff him thats just power creeping him even more so when its his meta again heāll be even more necessary
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istg the moment Lucio isnāt absolute top of the meta people act like heās suddenly the worst thing in the world.
Thatās generally what it will feel like when most of a heroās value comes from a passive aura effect.
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I got a nice LĆŗcio yesterday. Because of him we managed to win fast, and he enabled our Rein to shine.
But man, LĆŗcios players are getting rarer and rarer these days. For a start, they could be fixing his bad gun, and it would make him more popular.
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Lucio in ladder play is like being asked to be yelled at by your team. I play support in GM and it is almost impossible to get anywhere near the same value on Lucio in OW2 (as it is right now) compared to OW1. Even when Lucio was a bad pick in OW1. Itās amazing how, even though they removed stuns, they made Lucio WORSE to play lol.
Heās not fun to play as anymore. He canāt get anywhere near the value he got in OW1. The jobs he was picked got in OW1 are impossible to do now. The play style the dev team encouraged in OW1 with his 2017 rework -specifically citing it was to use more of his kit, be played aggressively, and be a high risk, high reward hero, is now actually feeding. He canāt disrupt tanks. He canāt harass back lines. He canāt get a solo kill on almost any relevant target -if at all, if the immensely high PR heros Kiriko or Mercy are on the enemy team.
There is just no reason whatsoever beyond personal preference and the āfun of the heroā to take him anymore. He simply can get no where near the value the current big three can - Ana, Kiriko or Mercy. And as for āfunā; since the playstyle the devs themselves built and forced on him in 2017 -the āfunā playstyle people have come to accept, which forced him away from sitting behind his team basically healbotting and spamming- is no longer possible, he simply isnāt even āfunā anymore either. The only way to get value on him is ironically to play him in the way they reworked him AWAY from in 2017.
With the previewed S4 patch notes reverting some of the Mercy changes and slap on the wrist nerfing Ana, along with a much needed nerf to Casā¦ MAYBE he will be remotely playable. But on paper, I am not seeing it. Mercyās pick rate will go down, but I donāt think any support other than Kiriko will pick up that slack. Itās going to drive a bigger wedge between the already huge gulf between the top picked support heros, and the lackluster ones. It will just be Ana and Kiriko now, rather than Ana, Kiriko and Mercy.
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Lucio: I get picked before the round is lost to stall the point and i hit widow on the head woooooooohhh
I agree to a degree with some of what you are saying butā¦ Brig and Lucio both deny Ball in a similar way. If you are good on both heros, you truly can get by on Lucio to do that job just as well. So saying itās a Brig meta over Lucio isnāt quite accurate. Add to that that both Brigs AND Lucios combined PR is still incredibly lowā¦itās still not a great argument lol.
But the biggest red flag read hereā¦ The tank that got nerfed this season is Reinhardt, not Ball. I personally think Ball is a bigger problem, but he isnāt getting S4 nerfs. Rein is. Which, on paper to the dev team making the balance changes, means Rein has been a stronger tank all season -they specifically say he has been over performing. And traditionally, if nothing else, the most solid time to take a Lucio is when you have a Rein. Despite that, Lucios PR was still bad last season. It still felt terrible to take him. And Brig is still getting buffed for this coming season.
I donāt think Lucio is bad honestly. I think his ultimate is a little stale in the state of OW2 and could use a little dusting off, and I think his Sound wave could get the knockback bumped up a tiny smidge (to make it in par with the other knockbacks in the game. Lucios knockback which is one of the biggest parts of his kit, currently comically feels like the weakest knockback barring Suzuā¦add in every single hero being given movement abilities, the tank passive, and any reworked heros getting new movement alsoā¦Lucios primary way of existing, and the reason to pick him, has been eroded away.) I think his kit has just gotten a bit outdated so it canāt be used in the way it was designed which is what makes him unfun to play. But basically, I think he is balanced. The issue is that there are support heros who have been so constantly too strong for so long, there isnāt a reason to take a reasonably balanced hero, even if he WERE able to be played in a fun way (which he isnāt).
We will see if the Cas and Mercy changes open things up for him a bit. No matter what I do think his Sound wave knockback should be boosted up a tiny bit though.
People sleep on Lucio way too much. Lucio has literally been a part of more overwatch metas than any other hero in the game. Speed boost is so powerful and yāall act like itās not lol
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Lucio with all toolkit he has does not really need changes. He has his style and does not stand out to me as character who āneeds supportā. All good, he can stay as he is.
Lifeweaver: So I can create a flower to elevate or block people, I can throw a giant tree to heal everyone, dash around, teleport people to me and more.
Bap: I will take Lucio as my co-support, please, since Iād much prefer speed and Sound Barrier over this gimmicky crap thatās of no use outside of very high level play. Iāll go to that restaurant with you afterwards though, if the offerās still on the table.
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Lucio isnāt bad, he just feels outdated compared to newer kits or reworks so like Candi said, in GM if I pick Lucio Iām basically throwing unless I have a Rein and everyone plays around speed.
I mained him for the most part of OWās lifetime, been GM on him since 2018 and was probably around 5k hours played on him and in OW2 I donāt even think I played him 100 hours so far in 6 months.
The issue a lot of players have with Lucio right now is he is NOT FUN to play in the way he is designed to be played. Itās not necessarily that he is weak. Speed boost is valuable. Itās much MORE valuable in pro play than competitive ladder play, but still. He is still being passed up in for raw heals right now, but thatās fine.
But even when he is a strong or fine hero to play in OW2ā¦you canāt use his fun kit to the fullest anymore. You are most rewarded for playing low risk and sitting behind your team using speed boostā¦ Which requires zero skill from the Lucio user to do. The ONLY valuable part of his kit now - when and if itās useful at all- is the part of his kit that requires zero ability or agency on the part of the Lucio player to use. Theyāve dumbed him down immensely. He used to be a low skill floor, high skill ceiling hero to use. You canāt play at that ceiling anymore, you have to play on the skill floor to get the only value in the heroā¦if there is even a reason to take that value anyway.
Itās not āoh Lucio is weak buff Lucioā. Itās Lucio (and most of the other supports) have been very clearly outclassed by a select few other supports with a rift that has only grown bigger (therefore, tone those supports down before trying to buff other supports up), and that Lucios intended playstyle - what made him fun AND skillful- is unplayable. It dumbs down the hero even if he DOES get use. That is the common complaint I see regarding Lucio, and certainly my take as well as a GM suppott player. Heās just not fun or useful enough to take over the too good supports (who have been too good basically since launch of OW2 in ladder play), and even if/when you do take him, he feels much worse to play as.
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100% agree. Rein wasnt op. I dont know what they are smoking. I honestly do not think in GM i have seen many reins get played. He sort of falls off in value after diamond imo. All ive seen mostly is ball, ram and sig. Ball has been the biggest problem all season imo and the fact he gets no changes is mental
And they are nerfing ana so she cant sleep him as long cus of the tank passive nowā¦. So hes even less counterable
Expecting ball to continue to be super oppressive in season 4 and thus brig will continue to be necessary because other than her and ana supports got nothing against the hamster
Considering we have lifeweaver now to counter boops I honestly wouldnt mind them buffing lucioās knockback a lil bit.
If we didnt have lifeweaver with his pull i would be against them buffing boop because its already frustrating to get killed by the environment. But considering you can save people from it now I wouldnt mind a lil knockback buff
I agree with you. I will say as someone who does play a lot of Lucio, but also is the first support to flex to fill the spot missingā¦Lucioās knockback (particularly for environmentals) is very weak. It may not seem that way because you remember the one time it happens, or you think if when it happened to you a lot in OW1, or you watch or play lower SR games where people just stand on edges and a strong breeze can knock them offā¦
Is getting a sick environmental, or multi-kill, with a knockback? Sure of course, the same goes for any hero who can do that (though almost every other environmental option in the game is able to do so with a stronger knockback, more reliably, and from a much safer location). But realistically, the main reason Lucio players are using Soundwave, is to disrupt the enemy team. Itās to sort of harass the tanks (which he canāt really do anymore, but was one of his primary roles in OW1), and harass the backline (which he is immediately punished for even attempting now). So itās mostly to justā¦keep enemies off of him. But even Zenās introduced Snapkick does a better job than Lucioās SW at doing that. Itās just a pretty impotent ability right now, and doesnāt really solidly fill any purpose now. Upping the knockback a bit will let him at least somewhat move tanks off him (as Lucio is often towards the front of his team, he is often right near an enemy tank), and add a reason to take that risk to bother the backline.
Lucio was hard meta for the first 2 seasons and only fell off because he doesnāt pair well with Wreckingball. Even then heās still the optimal main support in rush/brawl comps and Reinhardtās only not meta in high ranks because Ballās better and the map pool favors Sigma.
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